


storm front sundaes

by midnightflame



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Flirting, Fluff, Galaxy Garrison, Ice Cream, M/M, Pre-Kerberos Mission, Shiro knows exactly what he is doing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-08
Updated: 2017-10-08
Packaged: 2019-01-10 19:54:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12306561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/midnightflame/pseuds/midnightflame
Summary: There are a few things held sacred at the Garrison for Keith: show up to class on time, maintain a clean uniform, and know how to make a proper sundae.Shiro gets two out of the three right.





	storm front sundaes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Snowisdelight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snowisdelight/gifts).



> Finally getting back to the last of my requests, this one being for [Snow](https://twitter.com/Snowisdelight)! She had asked for Garrison Sheith fluff featuring ice cream, and thus this was born. This was a lot of fun for me to write, so thank you again for the amazing prompt! <3

Takashi Shirogane is a monster.

Sitting across from him at one of the dining hall’s many tables, he’s poking at a bowl full of vanilla soft serve covered in chopped peanuts. 

Chopped peanuts.

No chocolate sauce. No whipped cream. No fucking cherry on top.

Just the goddamned peanuts.

Yesterday, it had been smashed bits of Heath bar. The day before that? Gummy worms. You know what happens to gummy worms when you bury them in ice cream? They get stiff and cold, and by the time they make it into your mouth, it’s like trying to grind down frozen, sugary corpses between your teeth. An effort that strips the whole ice cream fanfare of the pleasure you should be deriving from it and instead reminds you of just how hard you have to work for any small sliver of it.

“You want a bite?” Shiro asks, holding out a spoonful with more hope than Keith wants to consider.

Hope is a heavy thing to roll around your mind. It makes you reconsider things. Not just the small things, but the big ones like _how will my choice here today affect the people of tomorrow_. Keith wants to think that denying Shiro for the third time this month won’t have any lasting effects on the universe, but sometimes, the way those gray eyes burn with potential make him think that he might just end up kicking another star out of the sky if he does.

Punt it right out into the void along with Shiro’s disastrous taste in ice cream toppings. 

“No,” Keith finally answers. He rolls his tongue along the front of his teeth, his gaze centered dead on Shiro. Because he knows what’s coming next.

“Are you -“

“Surer than Iverson is about next month’s eclipse.”

“That’s pretty much a set-in-stone thing, Keith. We’re not talking storm patterns here.”

Shiro shrugs and slides the previously proffered bite into his mouth, curling his lips around the end of the spoon and pulling the contents clean off. 

“Storms have some level of predictability,” Keith points out. He pushes his tray off to the side, his bowl of southwestern corn chowder (which is no different from the regular corn chowder aside from having red pepper added to it but novelty comes cheap at the Garrison) cleaned out, and his utensils set neatly on the used but still properly folded napkin. He’s about to let his gaze roam over the dining hall when he catches the smile just barely hanging onto Shiro’s lips, like a secret waiting to be cracked open.

“Sort of like you, huh?”

There it is. 

Keith can feel his cheeks flare warm at that even as his eyes narrow at Shiro. “I am nothing like that.”

Another shrug. Another scooped up bite of that godforsaken concoction melting in Shiro’s bowl, daring to call itself dessert. 

Spoon licked clean, Shiro points it at Keith, giving it little bobs as he swallows down his mouthful. He holds up his index finger, spoon still bouncing in the air, as he crunches on the last few bits of peanut. “You came into my life like a hurricane even though standing there you looked like the eye of the storm.”

Keith remembers that moment. Standing in Shiro’s room with his assignment in hand (‘from one ace pilot to the Garrison’s next hopeful’ had been Iverson’s words), he hadn’t known what to do with himself at first. Shiro seemed to have expected him but the room? Well. . .the disarray had made something in Keith twitch violently, like those first few warnings of a rattlesnake’s tail, predicting something swift and potentially death-inducing to come if an immediate course adjustment wasn’t undertaken. Shiro had smiled at him with all the sunlit warmth Keith remembered from his profile picture, the one that had come with the packet he still held in his hands, informing him that the Garrison’s top pilot would be his student mentor. 

He had briefly wondered if Shiro even knew his name. Or had it gotten lost in the mess of his room like some forgotten post-it note trapped between sheets of paper deemed more important? Keith had known his though, like everyone else who entered the Garrison’s halls, right down to his preferred “Shiro” instead of Takashi when it came to first name basis. 

Apologies had come with that same smile, though it took on a slightly embarrassed edge when Shiro seemed unable to locate his own folder in the mess of it all. Unable to stand it, Keith had dropped his packet on the desk with a solid _Sir_ , eyeing the stacks of papers with a twitch jolting his tongue. The folders should have contained the same basic information on this deal between them. 

Shiro had eyed the packet, something tight stringing his smile shorter than before, and rose from his chair like an incipient tidal wave. 

_Is your room always this jacked up?_

The question had dropped from Keith’s lips before he had the time to consider the real worth of asking it. 

Keith remembers the way Shiro had stood there, fingers splayed across his desk and gaze locked on the packet tossed before him, stalled mid-rise before pulling to his full height. Something had passed over his features then, drawing his brow together, and Keith had thought that of all the screwed up moments in his life so far, this, perhaps, had been the one best suited for his death.

Then the laughter had come, loud and honest, and Keith’s cheeks had flared a siren red in response.

_How do you feel about clean-up duty?_

_Is that my punishment?_

_Consider it helping someone out, and a chance to learn about him, Keith._

“Your room was a hot mess, and yet your uniform was fully pressed. . .I felt like I’d tumbled down the rabbit’s hole,” Keith retorts, batting the spoon away from his face.

Shiro laughs, and it promises freedom the same way blue skies streaked with contrails do. No judgment here, only open air and the road to an open heart. Setting his spoon down into his glob of vanilla ice cream, Shiro grins up at Keith. Nothing is said, not at first, but Keith knows it’s coming.

Words are brewing on Shiro’s tongue, and he watches as the flame heating them climbs up and starts dancing in the gray of his eyes. Silence continues to seal Shiro’s lips, however. Keith swings his legs over the bench then pushes himself up with another glance tossed at Shiro. He’s still silent, still grinning. Reaching over to grab his tray, he thinks he might just get away without any further digs into his personality or this relationship of theirs, but just as he gets his tray in hand, Shiro’s voice hits him with all the amused fondness he has come to hate and love in equal measures. 

“Do you still feel lost, dear Alice?”

Keith’s hands clamp down over the tray.

“Are you looking to lose your head?”

Laughter bursts over Shiro’s tongue, loud enough to draw a few looks their way, but Shiro appears wholly unrepentant over that fact. He’s still laughing when Keith works his way over to the countertop where the used dishes are left, and Keith swears the sound has taken to roosting in his head when he grabs himself a bowl and starts filling it with soft serve.

Vanilla.

Because some things need to be done right.

With a shake of his head, he tapers his ice cream stream to that fine soft-serve point, then sets the bowl down. Right beside the machine is a long table with twenty clear plastic cartons set into perfectly cut square holes. Each has a tan spoon to call its own, dug into whatever toppings fill its insides. If the Garrison got anything right - aside from mac-and-cheese Shiro insisted - it was in making sure the students and staff could top their desserts with whatever their hearts so desired. The contents range from chopped peanuts (Keith pointedly ignores that container) to a variety of fruits soaked in syrups to sprinkles of all colors right on down to crushed cookie bits and candy. Separated by about six inches of steel countertop, four more containers sit in a neat row - chocolate sauce, caramel, butterscotch, and marshmallow fluff.

Keith had been particularly impressed with the latter, as it remains one of the best but most elusive of all ice cream toppings.

He doesn’t start there, though. First, he scoops several spoonfuls of crushed Oreo bits over his soft-serve mountain, watching as they cascade down the sides like miniature boulders. This is followed by one generous spoonful of chopped up strawberries. Next, comes a careful drizzle of chocolate sauce. He tops it all off with a dollop of marshmallow fluff on either side of the bowl and a final splash of caramel. 

A moment of consideration as he pauses, hand hovering over the clear glass bowl filled with cherries steeped in bright red syrup. The corner of his mouth twists, and with another shake of his head, Keith turns without taking one.

There's a delicate balance when it comes to sundaes.

Bowl in hand, he snags a spoon out of the utensil holder and makes his way back to the table. Shiro’s gaze tracks him the entire way, remorseless, eager. When he finally sits, placing the ice cream between them, Shiro gives a low appreciative whistle. “Do I -“

Keith picks up his spoon, snaring first a bite of marshmallow before digging into the heart of the bowl. “You can have a bite, yes.”

Chuckling, Shiro simply watches as Keith slides the first bite into his mouth, and as much as he hates it, he knows the smile that Shiro wears next is born from the expression of pure joy he makes as the elements of his sundae melt together perfectly over his tongue. It’s then, and only then that Shiro picks up his own spoon and scoops out a portion for himself.

“I don’t know why you even ask anymore,” Keith says, half mumbling around his next spoonful. “You do this every time.”

“That’s because you never eat the ones I bring over.”

He’s not pouting, not earnestly. Keith knows this much, so he spares no mercy with his next comment. 

“Maybe if you didn’t insist on creating abominations out of the ice cream station, I would.” 

“I think they taste perfectly fine.” 

“Liar.” 

Shiro nearly chokes on his next spoonful and the laughter that consumes it. He takes a long moment as Keith continues to dig into his sundae, slowly savoring each bite. But he keeps his gaze fixed firmly on Shiro with only the slight arch of an eyebrow to question it all.

“That obvious?” 

“That obvious,” Keith echoes with a faint smirk.

Swirling his spoon so several lines of chocolate start to infiltrate the marshmallow fluff on his side of the bowl, Shiro glances up at Keith. 

“I can’t help it,” he admits. 

Keith notes that he’s still smiling, that there’s still fire burning in his eyes. Even so, he bites.

“Can't help what?” 

The smile tugs a little harder, threatening to turn into a grin. Keith can already feel the groan building in his throat, but when Shiro speaks, there’s nothing. No words, no lamentation for some poor joke, because Shiro is full of them and Keith loves those too just as much as he hates them.

“Wanting what you bring to the table.”

Nothing, because he’s never needed to counter Shiro when he’s being genuinely honest. Cheeks burning, Keith buries the head of his spoon into the ice cream, glad he had left the cherry behind because that would have been the real joke to end this.

“Would you help me finish this already?”

Another chuckle from Shiro, softer this time, warm in all the ways that turn his heart into a gelatin mess of feelings and dreams. 

“As you command.” 


End file.
